continued...

About 10 minutes after the pick was announced, but before the 19th pick is up, Pete Winemiller came back out and announced that Sue was on the phone…

PW: …What do you know about Seattle? Give us some thoughts.

SB: I don’t know much but somewhere I heard though that it’s a great city. I definitely heard about the rain but I’ve also heard that it’s beautiful in the summer so I’m really looking forward to getting out there.

PW: Very good. Here’s a question for you. What’s the number one strength you bring to the Seattle Storm? How would you describe that?

SB: Being a point guard, the advantage that I have is that I can do a lot of different things. I can shoot the ball pretty well and I can run offensive and things like that. But the most important thing I think I can do is do whatever my team needs me to do. I pretty flexible when it comes to that so I’m not going to go crazy like that so other than that I hope I bring whatever the team needs.

PW: Sue I don’t know if you’ve heard this or not, but we’ve got the number one fans in the WNBA. [crowd applauds] The number one fans in the WNBA want to hear from you, so what do you want to say to them right now?

SB: [she laughed a little nervously] Aaah, how you doing? I want to say that I really look forward to playing in front of you guys and you know, my mom is really excited about it. It’ll be a great fit.

PW: Sue, thanks so much. We look forward to seeing you here in Seattle and Storm fans give it up for your number one pick, Sue Bird. [more applause]

At some point during the phone call, Seattle picked Lucienne Berthieu from Old Dominion with the 19th pick. No, we didn't get a phone call from Lu.

Player Q&A

In addition to all the Storm management on hand, Michelle Marciniak, Jamie Redd and Charmin Smith are also here. It was interesting to watch them during the first few picks. It looked like they may have had something riding on who was picked when beyond who their future teammates might be. As soon as Sue was picked #1, a group of about five reporters surrounded Michelle for her opinions.

After the media get their quotes and Howard Schultz take a moment to sign the "Welcome Sue" banner [I guess if you own the team, you can take half the banner to sign your name], the three players take a seat in front of the crowd to take some questions.

PW: So first, I want to introduce Michelle Marciniak, University of Tennessee. This is going into her second season with the Storm. Jamie Redd from the University of Washington, Go Huskies, in her third season with the Storm and going into her third season from University of Stanford, Stanford University [correction after a look from Charmin], Charmin Smith. Okay, I’m going to open it up to questions.

Fan: This question’s for Michelle. I was wondering if were planning any payback for that headlock that Lisa Leslie put you in?

MM: Well, um, I’ve been thinking about that. And all I can say is that my girls sitting next to me, they got my back.

PW: Okay, any other questions.

Fan: I’m a big Sheila Lambert fan and seen her play a lot in high school and so forth. Jamie, have you played against her in pickup games or around town?

JR: Um, yeah actually I think I met Sheila for the first time in the eighth or ninth grade. Sheila is an exceptional athlete. She’s a great passer and she’s fun to play with. I’ve had the opportunity to play with her and play against her. You know, she hung out a lot when I was at the University of Washington at our practices. She was kind of a fixture around there. But she ended up going to another school, so I do know her well and I wish her well with even with her injury because I think she’ll have a great impact on the WNBA.

PW: Great. Okay. Other questions?

Fan: This is for each of you in turn. What aspect of your game do you think you bettered the most in this off season?

PW: Let’s start with Michelle here.

MM: I’ve worked on my ball handling for one. But I’ve also worked on catching on the wing and creating from, a pass, you know, on the wing. So, just making moves from the wing spot and not just always from the top. So, working on getting open and you know reading the defense and stuff like that. I’ve also been working on my jump shot. I feel like I’ve improved a great deal. Getting a couple hundred shots up a day. I mean the three of us are in the gym all the time, every day and you know just working in the off season. It’s been, I’ve been here since January 4th and it’s been a tremendous advantage for me to practice with Jamie and Charmin and Coach Klop and get good repetition.

JR: The thing that I’ve worked on pretty much is my ball handling. I don’t if most of you guys in college you know I was really flashy and you know so when I got to the next level I had to tone it down to make sure I could make a team so that part of game is actually coming back, you know the flashy passing and the shake and bake. That’s all coming back and for me the most important thing is consistency with my shooting and scoring and finishing shots under the basket.

CS: I have a few challenges. I’ve been trying to focus a lot on my mental approach and having a lot of confidence. Mostly on the offensive end of the court obviously. You know I want to be a threat offensively and a lot of times I’m out here in practice and I do things that I never even attempt to do in the games and so I think that all has to do with just me being confident and going out there and trying to make something happen. So, I’ve been watching these guys and they do something and I’m like show me that again. And you know the more I practice it, now I’m starting to feel comfortable and you know that will feed into my confidence so that I can be more of a threat offensively.

PW: Okay, any other questions? We are going to take a couple more then we are going to go back to the draft and before we pick the 28th pick because that’s next on the board for us. We will raffle off the autographed ball.

Fan: How much does your college allegiance play into how you interact together on the team and how you play against some of the other people you played against when you were in college? We just saw Stacey Dales and Asjha Jones go to Washington and they just played each other in the Final Four.

AD: Very good question. We’ll start with Charmin on this one.

CS: Well, as far as being on the same team, it just makes it kind of fun. You know, I mean, we talk a little trash every once in a while. We have the Pac 10 rivalry thing here and then Tennessee, you know, everybody likes to beat Tennessee. It’s always been such a great program, you know. It’s a compliment to her university, definitely. So when you are teammates it just adds a little fun in the locker room, banter, things like that. When you go up against other players, for me, I remember what somebody did to me in college or what we did, you know, and there’s always the issue of payback and things like that. You remember and then I also like seeing my college teammates and playing against them and getting a chance to catch up.

PW: Let’s take one more question. Right here.

Fan: This is for each of you. What do you think that with the new addition, well we now know the number one draft, but also of Lauren Jackson’s coach will make an impact.

MM: I don’t know much about Coach Graf but I do know that she’s been a very successful coach. Lauren speaks very highly of her. So, we are excited to, you know, bring a new face in here. And as far as the, you know, the number one pick and actually Berthieu who we took in the second round, I mean I think you can tell that our team, we were just talking about this in the locker room is getting a little younger and I think that’s going to add a lot energy and excitement, you know, for you the fans and for us as a team. Just to have some new energy and some exciting energy, you know, out there on the court.

CS: I think the addition of Lauren’s coach is a great thing for our team because I think the first season, Lauren’s first year here, I mean who else did she know in Seattle? Everything was new and she was so homesick and that, I think that had an effect on her ability to perform every night and I think just having someone that she’s extremely familiar with and someone whose familiar with Lauren cause we didn’t know Lauren and, you know, she’s, she’s Lauren so, you know, it’ll be cool to have someone who can relate to her a little more closely than what we did last year. So I think that’s definitely an advantage.

PW: Okay we are going to take it back to the draft on ESPN. I want to thank Michelle, Charmin and Jamie.

Another Storm staffer: I’ve had a few questions from fans. They want to know about the last two draft picks. They want to hear some more information. [the Storm made the 28th pick during the Q&A]

PW: Okay, Seattle Storm in the 19th pick in the second round picked Lucienne Berthieu out of Old Dominion. I’ll tell you a little bit about Lucienne. First off, she’s on the French National Team. She was the Colonial Athletic Association Player of Year in 2001 and she lead scoring for the CAA in scoring 17.8 point average in 2000. So a scorer there. I hear that she’s a banger on the inside so that’s good. Give us a little muscle on the inside. And then on the 28th pick, the Storm picked Felicia Ragland out of Oregon State. 5’9“ guard. Give you a little bit of stats on Felicia here. She was the PAC 10 player of the year in 2001, All PAC 10 team 2002, 2001 and 2000, and she lead the PAC 10 in 3 point percentage as a junior. So pretty impressive… We have the 35th pick coming up in the third round.

We didn't stick around for the 3rd round.